Has the magic disappeared? How Pep Guardiola is in danger of ruining his legacy at Manchester City

“I’m closer to leaving than staying.”

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola said this after his side won a record fourth consecutive Premier League title in 2024.

And it was the perfect opportunity to sign off. Six league wins, a first UEFA Champions League title and much more were achievements that were greater than he could have hoped for when he came to the ‘toughest league in the world’ in 2016.

But instead the 55-year-old opted to sign a contract until 2027 and is currently going through the worst period of his entire managerial career.

City was eliminated from the UCL by Real Madrid for the third season in a row on Tuesday evening and is nine points behind leaders Arsenal in the Premier League. Furthermore, due to their inconsistent form, City will not enter the League Cup final and FA Cup quarter-final against Arsenal and Liverpool respectively as favorites.

This entire crisis comes down to one simple question. Should Guardiola have resigned at the top and let a new face rebuild the team, just as he did ten years ago? Did he miss his chance to leave as a hero and end up staying long enough to become the villain?

Anyone who has followed Guardiola knows that there is a certain seven-letter word that is fundamental to the way his team plays. CONTROL. For years, Guardiola’s teams have frustrated opponents across Europe with endless passes from front to back, left to right and whatnot.

City was no exception.

While many disputed that his system would not suit England’s high-intensity style, it took Guardiola just a year to silence those claims, helped by the excellence of players like Kevin De Bruyne, David Silva, Ilkay Gundogan and many more.

The arrival of Erling Haaland in 2022 was the final cog in Guardiola’s wheel, as the Norwegian scored 52 goals in all competitions to lead City to a historic treble.

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However, much of Guardiola’s success as a manager came from midfield, from Xavi, Andreas Iniesta and Sergio Busquets at Barcelona to Xabi Alonso, Bastian Schweinsteiger and Thiago Alcantara at Bayern Munich.

At City, the three spots were filled by De Bruyne, Gundogan and Rodri, who were all vital and not only played as defenders but also occasionally put the ball in the back of the net.

However, nothing and no one escapes the inevitability of time.

Gundogan left and returned for an unremarkable second stint ahead of the 2024/25 season, while both Rodri and De Bruyne suffered long-term injuries, with the latter leaving the club ahead of the current season.

Subsequently, the trend of passing around had lost momentum in the Premier League. Long throws and long balls made a comeback, with teams bypassing midfield to attack more directly and with more physicality, trends that are likely to be frowned upon in Guardiola’s school of football.

Figures show that City averaged 66.43 percent of ball possession in the Spaniard’s first eight seasons, dropping to 60.7 percent in the last two seasons kshk.

As control slipped away, so did City’s skill in front of goal. Until the end of the 2023/24 season, the club averaged 17.33 shots per 90 minutes in the Premier League, while in the next two that number dropped to 15.32.

The effect was also telling on the other side of the goal. Rodri’s injury and recurring absences in the back line allowed teams to exploit the gaps in City’s defence. The number of shots per 90 City conceded rose from 7.03 to an alarming 9.5 in the last two league campaigns. Last season, City conceded 44 goals, the first time the score exceeded 40 in the Guardiola era. No control meant no success.

The club’s attempts to revamp an aging squad with financial firepower also did not work.

There have been major holes to fill and replacements such as Omar Marmoush, Rayan Cherki and Tijjani Reijnders, among 13 signings, have failed to find consistency on the pitch due to Guardiola’s eccentric team selection and inability to fixate on a playing eleven.

Nico Gonzalez filled in well for Rodri, but was relegated to the bench when an injury no longer held back the Ballon d’Or winner. On the other hand, despite the signings, Guardiola’s obsession with experimenting with his wing-backs has seen him often recruit the younger Nico O’Rielly into midfield and pair him with the older Bernardo Silva, who has started 26 of 30 games in the league this season.

For comparison: Reijnders and Cherki have 31 starts together.

A troubled midfield had a knock-on effect on the forwards, who began to see less and less of the ball, especially Haaland, who scored just five goals in 15 games in 2026.

The latest examples of Guardiola’s team realignment came during the 1-1 draw against West Ham United and the UCL round of 16 first leg against Real. At the Bernabeu, Guardiola suddenly decided to drop Matheus Nunes, who has had a commendable reinvention as a right-back this season, leaving Uzbek centre-back Abdukodir Khusanov to defend against Vinicius Jr’s blistering pace.

Furthermore, in attack he opted not to play as a conventional attacking midfielder and entrusted Antoine Semenyo to carry the ball, a task the winger struggled with. Real eventually won 3-0 that evening.

While Guardiola passionately defended his choices at the time, days later he admitted he had made a mistake by not using creative playmaker Cherki against relegation-fighting Hammers. «Bad selection, now you can criticize me incredibly, for the selection, now I deserve it,» Guardiola accepted after the match.

For someone with an ego-driven need to win, that admission felt like admitting defeat. Perhaps it was that ego that pushed him to extend his stay on English shores, but looking at potentially two consecutive trophyless seasons, it appears his stay in Manchester had come to an end.

After two years of adapting to the changes around it, City urgently need to complete the transition from its recent golden era. While Guardiola has taken the team to unimaginable heights, his need to scale up further is diminishing his legacy, and a fresher face and ideas on the sidelines are needed to cultivate this new crop of players.

As the old saying goes, “All good things must come to an end.” For Guardiola, after ten years (his longest stay at one club) and eighteen trophies, good has turned to bad, and he should be the one to put an end to things before things get ugly.

Published on March 18, 2026